Well I’m still on a boat out in the middle of the ocean so today we havea guest poster Kim from Reposhture!
Yippee Day DO! That is what we say in our house when there is something to be happy about and I’m sayin’ it ‘cuz Amber asked me over for a visit and a guest post!
Hi I’m Kim from Reposhture! I consider myself a baby blogger as my blog is only a few months old but she is starting to roll over, with the help of people like Amber!
All kidding aside, I want to thank Amber so much for asking me to guest post on her amazing blog. I am particularly impressed with how she lives her life so purposefully. I can learn from her which is why blogs rock my world. They help others all around the world and you get to meet people you would never normally run into in your neck of the woods.
So what do you want to know about me? I sometimes act blonder than I pay to be, I love to make fun of myself because you can’t take yourself too seriously, I love God, parentheses and exclamation points, (no really! I do!), really like to use 70’s sayings, like Shazam and groovy. Initial art and run-on sentences and I sell painted furniture on the side, when I am not being a full-time mom and wife, part-time audiologist, and part-time craft/furniture refinisher blogger. That makes me like three kinds of tired.
I have made things my whole life and hardly ever use things the way they were meant to be used. That would be boring and expensive and in my own mind, I am amazingly fun, but really cheap. One of my goals with my blog is to help people to look at things in a different light or use things in a different way and inspire them to rethink the ordinary into the extraordinary. Often times my changes are little but they make a big difference, sometimes it is a truly Ah Ha! moment and I have to do my happy dance. I have seen some of your creations and I know you all are doing some pretty exciting happy dances as well!!
My deeper hope is that my words will inspire you to look at yourself in a new light and go do some lovin’ on yourself so you can love on others really, really well. When you love yourself well, you are better able to be creative and trust yourself to try new things. Let God do His work, and the rest is actually not bad!
Since Amber is all about being green and I’m really trying to be more green we thought we’d “re-cycle” one of my posts today. This is one of my first posts and one of my first furniture projects that got sold. My main purpose of the blog is to sell recycled furniture, either re-painted or refinished. You can visit my shop to see my work and get a sense of my aesthetic. The rest of my blog posts are generally about my crazy, batty, fun repurposes or just me being all sorts of crazy, batty fun! So I really hope you will stop by and visit often and let me know you came ‘cuz that makes me feel out a’ sight!
SO on with the Post……
Oh to be sooooo relaxed as my little pair of chairs!
Them before- very stressed out over how they look =0(
Before
This is how they got relaxed…. First I had to strip the varnish because it was so bad. Then sand, fill holes with wood putty, sand again, prime, paint in a nice semi-gloss antique white oil based paint. Sand edges to distress the finish and then let them relax while I tackled the seat cushions. They are currently getting a nice polyurethane soak at the spa. Always a good way to unwind.
Remove old cover and save to use as a template on new fabric. The cotton batting was so old, first of all it WAS cotton AND it stuck to the fabric! I used burlap because the chairs look rustic to me and therefore I thought a rustic material was in order and tres chic! It really is comfortable for all of yous guys who think, “WHAT THE?!?”
Covered in burlap from the back. Do you see the two holes? yeah, had to drill 2x to get the center for the tufted button
Make your piping. I just used the old piping for length and then cut my burlap on the bias. That means diagonal in sewing talk and it allows you make your piping go around edges easily.
I made a double piping using my burlap and then just some store-bought piping.
This is it married. See opposites do attract!
I made it wider than the original piping because I would need more selvage to staple with, you’ll see in the next photo….
How to finish the edge
Here is a little free tutorial within a, oh, yeah free tutorial. Covered buttons. Covered buttons on just about everything make it look custom made vs. store bought so get you button covered ninja on and never look back at plain buttons again. Not that there is anything wrooong with plain buttons!
These come in packages so you get all the tools that you need. Then you can just get the replacement supplies for next time unless, you change up sizes like me, in which case you’ll have every size tool for covering buttons. Ever. Now, place fabric on the white “bowl” and then press button into it.
Like so
and so…
Place button back over top and use blue “thingy” to press it into place. You may feel a pop when it catches. If you get just one side, press again on that side and see how you did
Pressed but not popped out yet, it can’t wait to be put on the seat!
Now get yerself some long Doll needles
Thread it so you have 4 strands and use heavy duty thread
Go up through the correct center hole, through the button shank and back down through correct hole.
Now PUUULLLLLL! Staple the thread tightly back and forth several times to secure it so it looks tufted. I was not able to take the picture that shows me STANDING on the back of the cushion, pulling, stapling over and over again and trying to photograph all at the same time. But you all have such great imaginations, you get the picture..
All Done
And all done, now nail cushion to chair base and sit and relax yourself!!!
Let’s Review:
Before: Stressed Out!
After: Relaxed, aahhhh!
Now, my little chairs are not de-stressed because they “look pretty” mind you. They had to go through a lot of hard work to get rid of all the stuff that was holdin’ them back from their beauty within. Just putting a coat of paint over old varnish would have looked good initially but as people got closer, all the little problems would have become visible and the paint would have started to crack.
So take a page out of my little blog and do the hard work on the inside, and it will be hard, but get rid of the stuff that is holding you back and when you get through it, your new self will shine through and no one can argue with that kind of long-lasting beauty
Always being renewed,
